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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29805849">you are my bitter rival (but i need you for survival)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/rocketshiptospace/pseuds/rocketshiptospace'>rocketshiptospace</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Julie and The Phantoms (TV 2020)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - College/University, College, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, First Meetings, M/M, Roommates, but like a terrible first meeting</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 18:08:02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,938</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29805849</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/rocketshiptospace/pseuds/rocketshiptospace</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Alex swings the door of his dorm room open with as much bravado as he can muster, only to be immediately be hit in the face with something hard and plastic that hurts like a motherfucker. “What the hell?!” He yells, clutching the side of his head that was impacted. The object that hit him clatters to the floor and Alex notices that it’s an ice hockey helmet.</p>
<p>His roommate is standing on the other side of the room, next to a bed that has an open suitcase on it. He looks stunned for a second, but when Alex sends him a truly stormy look, he frowns. “Well, I mean, who the fuck swings a door open like that?!”</p>
<p>“Oh, that’s rich,” Alex snipes, “So now it’s my fault that you hit me in the face with a fucking helmet?”</p>
<p>Or, Alex and Willie are college roommates. An unfortunate meeting leads them to hate each other, at first. Thankfully, things change.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Alex Mercer/Willie (Julie and The Phantoms)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>174</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>you are my bitter rival (but i need you for survival)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>hi!!! this is based on two different prompts i got on tumblr. the first was 'roommates + awful First Meeting' and the second one was 'college and enemies to lovers' and i just sort of... mashed them together into this one big hybrid prompt fill. hope you enjoy!!!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The hallway Alex is standing in is empty, which is probably a good thing. He’s been intensely staring down the door of what will be his dorm room for roughly ten minutes now, and if anyone saw him, they probably thought he was insane. He’s been going through the same loop over and over again, from ‘just go in, it will be fine’ to ‘your roommate will hate you and your life will be miserable’.</p>
<p>He can hear his roommate inside now, puttering around. That makes it even worse. If the room had been <em>empty</em> Alex could have just walked in and started unpacking, and when eventually his roommate showed up he could’ve been all casual like ‘Oh, hey, nice to meet you, welcome to our room’.</p>
<p>But Luke had been his ride here, and he’d been <em>late</em> because he couldn’t decide which of his guitars to bring (“This is an important decision, Lex! If I pick the wrong one my music will suck and I will <em>die</em>.”). So now Alex has to be the one to walk into the dorm room and his roommate gets to be all casual and cool about it, and this <em>sucks</em>.</p>
<p>He wishes he could just room with Luke, but there was no preference option when they signed up for the dorms. He called later to ask if they could room together after all, but the person on the phone cheerfully told him they don’t room friends together because ‘meeting strangers is part of the college experience’.</p>
<p>Alex could easily go four years without meeting <em>any</em> new strangers, but the lady on the phone didn’t budge. So now he’s hear, standing in front of this <em>goddamn</em> door, and he can’t find it in himself to actually go inside. His phone beeps, and it’s Luke, asking if he’s settled in yet and if he wants to come over. He sighs, gives the door one last hard glare, and then swings it open with as much bravado as he can muster.</p>
<p>Only to be <em>immediately </em>be hit in the face with something hard and plastic that hurts like a <em>motherfucker</em>. “What the hell?!” He yells, clutching the side of his head that was impacted. The object that hit him clatters to the floor and Alex notices that it’s an ice hockey helmet.</p>
<p>His roommate is standing on the other side of the room, next to a bed that has an open suitcase on it. He looks stunned for a second, but when Alex sends him a truly stormy look, he frowns. “Well, I mean, who the fuck swings a door open like that?!”</p>
<p>“Oh, that’s rich,” Alex snipes, “So now it’s <em>my</em> fault that <em>you</em> hit me in the face with a fucking helmet?”</p>
<p>His roommate throws his arms in the air. “I was <em>unpacking</em>!”</p>
<p>Alex cannot believe this is actually how his first interaction with his roommate is going. “Unpacking? Usually unpacking means taking things out of the bag <em>gently</em>, not flinging them across the room like some sort of lunatic!”</p>
<p>“I couldn’t find my pads,” his roommate says, crossing his arms. “This was the fastest way.”</p>
<p>“You are <em>ridiculous</em>,” Alex informs him, dropping his suitcases on the empty bed.</p>
<p>“Next time, just fucking knock,” his roommate grumbles, returning to his bag.</p>
<p>Alex can’t be here right now, with this person who thinks this is all <em>Alex’s</em> fault, with a face that’s throbbing and painful. He feels like he’s going to cry, and he doesn’t want to do it in front of his asshole roommate, and he grabs his phone and storms out the door. “Next time, just unpack like a normal fucking person,” he says, and slams the door behind him.</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Luke’s room is only one floor above Alex’s, and his roommate blissfully isn’t there. When Luke opens up the door he takes one look at Alex and lets out a heartfelt “Holy<em> shit</em>.”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Alex says, walking past Luke into his dorm room. It’s exactly like Alex’s, except it looks like a bomb exploded in there. Clearly both Luke and his roommate are absolute slobs.</p>
<p>“The <em>bruise</em>,” Luke says, sitting Alex down on his bed and gingerly touching the right side of Alex’s face. Alex hasn’t looked in a mirror yet, but he figures it looks pretty gruesome, based on the way it feels. “What the fuck happened?”</p>
<p>“Met my roommate,” Alex says, “turns out he’s an asshole.”</p>
<p>Luke’s face turns dark. “Alex… Did he hit you?”</p>
<p>Alex shakes his head. “No, no, he threw his helmet across the room right as I walked in. Smacked me right in the face. Then continued to blame me for it because I didn’t knock.” Alex pulls a face, which <em>hurts</em> and he winces.</p>
<p>“Dick,” Luke concludes. “Come on, lets go get you some ice. There’s a kitchen on this floor, maybe there’s an ice pack in there.”</p>
<p>“What about your roommate?” Alex asks, as they make their way towards the small community kitchen.</p>
<p>“He was really nice,” Luke says. “His name is Reggie. He’s also here for music, he plays the bass.” Luke gets a look on his face that Alex can only classify as scheming face. “Hey, maybe we should ask him if he wants to be in a band with us…”</p>
<p>Alex sends him a look. “You haven’t even been here for a <em>day</em>, Lucas. Maybe cool it on the band thing for now.”</p>
<p>They had talked about it before, forming a band. Luke loved music more than anything, and Alex did really enjoy playing the drums. There was something calming about it, something grounding. He could stop worrying about <em>everything</em> for a bit and just loose himself in the music. It would be amazing if that was something he could do as a job, in a band. But he also knew bands rarely ever make it big, that that is a one in a million chance. So that was what the college thing was for. A safety net. But Luke and him both knew that was not where their ambitions truly lie.</p>
<p>“Have you even heard him play yet?” He asks, as they walk into the kitchen.</p>
<p>Luke shakes his head. “But he just has this vibe about him, Lex! Like, you just <em>know</em> he’s going to be good.”</p>
<p>Alex snorts. “Like the vibe you got from that guy back in high school who turned out to be garbage?”</p>
<p>Luke frowns. “You can’t keep lording that over me, my vibe-meter was still in development back then.”</p>
<p>They’ve reached the kitchen now, and Luke rummages through the communal fridge, only to resurface triumphantly, holding a cold pack that has a ‘property of building C’ on it. He grabs the towel he had stuffed into his back pocket and wraps it around the thing, handing it to Luke.</p>
<p>“Aren’t we in building B?” Alex asks, pressing it to the right side of his face with a wince. “Also, please don’t call it a ‘vibe-meter’.”</p>
<p>“Vibe-meter,” Luke repeats, just to be a dick. His eyes light up. “We should name our band that. ‘Vibe-meter’. Has a nice-“</p>
<p>“If you say vibe I’m going to kill you.”</p>
<p>“-vibe to it.”</p>
<p>“Prepare to die.”</p>
<p>They stand there in silence for a bit, while Alex revels in the soothing feeling of the cool pack on his face. People keep milling in and out of the kitchen, and some send Alex curious looks, but no one comes over to talk to them, which serves Alex exceptionally well. After his asshole roommate he’s kind of done with this whole meeting new people business for the day.</p>
<p>“How’s your face?” Luke eventually asks, bouncing on his heels. He’s never been good at standing still for very long.</p>
<p>“Well, it’s still there, so that’s a start,” Alex says, but if he’s honest his face does feel a little better.</p>
<p>Luke nods, “You want to go back to my room? I wrote this song I want to show you. They probably won’t mind you borrowing that thing for a bit,” he says, gesturing at the ice pack Alex is still holding to his face.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Alex says, desperate to think about anything but the throbbing right side of his face. “Let’s go.”</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>They spend the rest of the afternoon going over songs Luke wrote, talking about the upcoming school week and watching movies on Netflix. Eventually Alex can’t postpone it any longer and he starts making his way back to his dorm room, making a little detour to return the ice pack.</p>
<p>He checked his face out in the mirror earlier that day and he has bruising pretty much all around his right eye and some on his cheek bone. It feels kind of tender to the touch, but all things considered it’s not <em>that </em>bad. The helmet wasn’t thrown at full force, so most of the impact came from the hard plastic rather than from the speed it was travelling at. Still, Alex isn’t really looking forward to seeing his asshole roommate again.</p>
<p>Thankfully, his room is empty when he swings open the door. There’s no sign of his roommate, anywhere, and he finally sets about packing his suitcases, in peace. When he’s done, and he feels like he made the place his, at least a little bit, he falls back down on the bed. He suddenly feels exhausted, and he struggles not to fall asleep immediately.</p>
<p>Instead, he hauls himself back out of bed, goes to brush his teeth, puts on a sleep shirt, and crawls under the covers. He’s asleep before his head even hits the pillow.</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Alex is rudely awoken a few hours later by the sound of a door, followed by clattering noises and loud shushing. He opens his eyes, confused for a second before he remembers he’s inside of his new dorm room. And that the ruckus is coming from his new favorite person in the whole world: his roommate.</p>
<p>His roommate is stumbling through the room, bumping into absolutely <em>everything </em>and making a ton of unnecessary noise. “Will you just turn on a fucking <em>light</em>,” Alex says, fed up and tired.</p>
<p>The light flashes on and there is his roommate, frowning at him. “I didn’t want to wake you,” he says.</p>
<p>“Well, mission failed,” Alex gripes, and buries himself under his blankets in order to block out some of the light and finally go back to sleep.</p>
<p>There’s silence, blissful delightful silence, and then, “I’m sorry, about earlier today. I’m Willie, by the way.”</p>
<p>“Alex,” Alex says, and then, because he doesn’t have <em>time</em> for niceties, he only has time for <em>sleep</em>, he adds. “Will you let me fucking sleep now?”</p>
<p>“Jesus Christ, fine, you fucking princess,” his roommate, <em>Willie</em>, says, and then stomps out of the room to go brush his teeth.</p>
<p>Alex hopes he chokes on his toothbrush, and then finally falls asleep again. He doesn’t wake up when Willie makes his return. But then again, he is a lot quieter this time around.</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Over the next few months, Alex learns three things about his new roommate;</p>
<ol>
<li>He’s a fucking slob. No, seriously. His stuff is <em>everywhere</em>. And he seems to think that because they share a room it’s totally okay to leave his stuff on Alex’s side as well, which is <em>not</em> okay and in fact very, very annoying.</li>
<li>He’s on the college’s ice hockey team, which explains the helmet from their first meeting. Unfortunately, in combination with point 1, this means that Willie’s sweaty stinky gear is <em>everywhere, all the time</em>. Alex is slowly starting to despise ice hockey. And just sports in general, because sometimes it seems like Willie does <em>all</em> of them. He’s up way too early in the morning to go for a run, and he is out way too late for late night hockey practice, and then in between Alex walks in on him just lifting weights in the middle of their room like Alex ever consented to this space also being a gym? So, yeah. Fuck sports.</li>
<li>He has way too many friends that filter in and out of the room, but his core three seem to be a broody punk looking dude called Bobby, a perky little cheerleader called Kayla, and a snooty little cheerleader called Carrie. They’re not bad, except that they all seem to <em>like</em> Willie, as a person, which makes Alex automatically distrust them.</li>
</ol>
<p>Or, to sum it up: Alex and Willie do <em>not</em> get along. They got off on completely the wrong foot, and now nothing Willie can do can really improve their relationship. Because that’s the thing, really. Alex has friends who are really messy (Luke) and who’s entire life surrounds one thing (also Luke, with music), and Willie’s friends are kind of <em>cool</em> all things considered. But it’s because this is <em>Willie</em> who threw a helmet at him and wouldn’t let him <em>sleep</em>, and who sometimes still interrupts Alex blissful sleeping time. It’s <em>Willie</em> and Alex simply cannot stand anything he does.</p>
<p>They avoid each other, mostly. Alex hangs out in the library, or with Luke and Reggie in their dorm, or with Julie and Flynn, who are in Economy 101 with him. Willie hangs out with his friends, or he’s doing sports things, or whatever Willie does when he’s not in the room. They greet each other when they bump into each other, sure, but other than that they hardly talk. This goes on for months, and Alex is mostly content about it. Not everyone can be blessed with a roommate like Reggie, who is just absolutely awesome.</p>
<p>It all takes a bit of a turn in April, when Alex has just started to accept that this is just how his college life is going to be. He’s spend most of the day in the library, studying with Flynn and Julie for their upcoming exam, so he’s ready to just crawl in bed with movies and some snacks and call it a day.</p>
<p>Except, when he wanders into the hallway of his dorm room, there’s someone sitting in front of his door. At first he thinks it’s Bobby, because he does that sometimes when he’s waiting for Willie, but then he realizes it’s actually Willie himself.</p>
<p>“The fuck you doing?” Alex asks. He isn’t being nice about it, but then again, he hadn’t planned on having to communicate with his roommate and it’s throwing him off.</p>
<p>Willie glares at him. “Haven’t you heard? This is just how the cool people spend their time these days.” He gets up from the floor, dusting off his pants. “I obviously got locked out, dipshit.”</p>
<p><em>“Why</em>?” Alex asks, and he knows he’s purposely being annoying. He could just unlock the door and leave it be, but he wants to push Willie’s buttons. Like some form of weird revenge for that time he woke up at four in the morning because Willie was going for a run and he couldn’t fall back asleep.</p>
<p>Willie sighs, and runs a hand through his hair, and Alex hadn’t noticed until now how upset he looks. “I got into a fight with my uncle, and I went outside to cool off for a bit but in my frustration I forgot my keys. There, happy now? Will you fucking let me inside now, oh mighty keeper of the keys?”</p>
<p>Alex softens. He knows all too well what it is like to fight with relatives. “I’m sorry,” he says, even though he has no idea what he is apologizing for. “That’s rough,” he finally leans over and opens the door, and Willie follows him inside.</p>
<p>“Yeah, well. It’s just how it is sometimes.” Willie flops down on his bed, and Alex sits down on his own.</p>
<p>He can’t believe he is actually sympathizing with Willie, but yet he can hear himself ask. “You want to talk about it?”</p>
<p>Willie is silent for a really long time, and Alex thinks he’s not going to say anything. But then he starts talking. “My uncle, he’s a performer. Singing, dancing, the whole shebang. He runs this theatre in Vegas that hosts dinner shows. He’s build the whole thing from the ground up, and because of that he thinks the only valuable career path is business. And entertainment, maybe. I don’t know. Long story short he’s not too fond of my ‘sports thing’ as he likes to call it.” Willie is looking at the ceiling, clearly avoiding looking at Alex.</p>
<p>“I want to pursue ice hockey, but he thinks it’s a waste of time.” Willie continues, “And he pays my tuition, so he basically owns my soul. If he wants me to pursue business, I have to pursue business or I have to find some other way to pay for college. It was fine my first year, because the courses weren’t that demanding yet, but for the upcoming school year he wants me to drop ice hockey.”</p>
<p>“That sucks,” Alex says, trying to sound as sympathetic as possible.</p>
<p>Willie snorts. “Understatement of the year,” he says, and finally turns to look at Alex. “I’m sorry for dumping all of this on you. I know you hate me, but it’s kind of nice to talk to someone about this who is not Bobby.”</p>
<p>“No, I get it,” Alex says, and then, “I don’t hate you.”</p>
<p>Willie sends him a look. “Sure you don’t.”</p>
<p>There’s a silence. Then suddenly, Alex blurts out, “I haven’t spoken to my parents since I was like sixteen.”</p>
<p>Willie doesn’t say anything, just looks at him, silently nudging him to go on.</p>
<p>Alex looks down at his hands. “It was after I came out. We just. We just stopped talking to each other. We still lived in the same house, and we said hi and bye and all that, but I never really <em>talked</em> to them again. No heart to hearts, not even a ‘how was your day’. Just. Coexisting.”</p>
<p>Willie stands up, and makes his way over, sitting down next to Alex on the bed. “I’m sorry,” he says, and Alex smiles wryly.</p>
<p>“I want to say it’s fine, but it’s not, not really,” He’s fidgeting with his hands as he says it. “But there’s not much I can do about it.”</p>
<p>“Sometimes,” Willie says, “parent figures just <em>suck</em>.”</p>
<p>Alex looks at him, and a small smile finds his way to his lips. “They really do, don’t they?”</p>
<p>Willie smiles back and him. “You know, you’re not so bad, after all.”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Alex says, smiling, “Turns out you’re not so bad, either.”</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>They’re different, after that. They actually talk to each other, for starters. Alex asks Willie about his day and Willie asks him how classes were and it’s <em>nice</em>. They’re not friends, perse, but they are definitely on friendly terms and that is a big shift from how it was like during the fist months of them being roommates.</p>
<p>Sometimes, Willie falls asleep at his desk because he’s knackered from the million sports things he does and Alex finds himself covering him with a blanket. Or that time Alex fell asleep holding his laptop and he woke up to find it neatly tucked away on his nightstand.</p>
<p>During exam week Willie brings him a cup of coffee from that fancy place just off campus, and Alex helps Willie with his flash cards for his business classes.</p>
<p>It’s nice, and it’s starting to feel like <em>home</em>, which is why the harsh reality of summer vacation kind of hits Alex in the face like a ton of bricks.</p>
<p>Because suddenly he’s packing and Willie is packing and they’re getting into respective cars and he walks into a house that is <em>silent</em> too silent and <em>god</em> he can’t believe he misses Willie already.</p>
<p>Summer is terrible, and boring, and his parents still don’t talk to him, and Alex spends most of it hanging out at Luke’s place. His parents are nice, if a bit apprehensive about his music career, and they let the boys hang out in the garage, where they can play music to their hearts content.</p>
<p>Reggie comes hang out with them for a week, and it’s nice, but it still feels like there’s something missing. Both in the band, and in Alex’s life in general. He can’t put his finger on what it is exactly, but it keeps nagging him the whole summer.</p>
<p>And then, before he knows it, his boring summer is over and they’re getting ready to go back to college again.</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Alex knocks this time before he enters, but the room is empty. Him and Willie are rooming together again, although not in the same room. This one is a bit bigger, and closer to most of the buildings Alex has classes in. He dumps his stuff onto one of the beds and starts unpacking.</p>
<p>He gets so into unpacking, even, that he doesn’t notice the door swinging open. He looks up when he hears someone clears his throat and shit.</p>
<p><em>Shit</em>.</p>
<p>Willie is right there, and he doesn’t look much different than he did before the summer, but Alex reaction to him is <em>definitely </em>different. There’s butterflies in his stomach and he feels himself flushing and oh my god he does <em>not</em> have a crush on his roommate. That’s a terrible cliché and he is <em>not</em> here for it.</p>
<p>“Alex!” Willie says, excitedly, beaming at him, and Alex’s treacherous heart does a little jump.</p>
<p>“Hi, Willie,” Alex says, smiling back at him, “How was your summer?”</p>
<p>Willie pulls a face and dumps his bag on the other bed. “Spend most of it hanging out at Caleb’s theatre. I saw <em>at least</em> 50 dinner shows this summer. I never want to see another ever again. Caleb even made me perform in some of them, it was <em>terrible</em>.”</p>
<p>Alex pictures Willie on a stage, possibly in a suit, smiling widely at a crowd of adoring fans. He thinks he wouldn’t mind being one of those adoring fans, and then frowns at himself. “Speaking of Caleb,” he says instead, “he on board with the ice hockey thing now?”</p>
<p>“Yeah!” Willie says, nodding excitedly. “I made a bunch of PowerPoints, about career paths and investing the money I would be making as a professional ice hockey player, stuff like that. He seemed really into it, and in the end he said that if this is what I truly wanted I should go for it.” Willie is practically vibrating with joy, and <em>god</em> he’s so <em>pretty</em>, how had Alex never noticed this before?</p>
<p>“That’s really cool,” he says, genuinely.</p>
<p> Willie falls down on his bed, sighing happily. “This,” he says, “Is going to be an <em>awesome</em> year.”</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Willie is partly right. The year <em>is </em>pretty awesome so far. They become even closer, to a point Alex feels comfortable calling Willie his friend. They hang out together, even with all of their friends sometimes. Up on learning Bobby plays guitar, too, Luke promptly asks him to join their band, showing Alex he has learned absolutely nothing in the past year. Bobby is really good though, and they sound nice, together.</p>
<p>Flynn and Carrie absolutely hate each other, and also they’re apparently dating now. Alex, like the rest of their friends, decides to just roll with it.</p>
<p>Autumn comes and goes, and winter starts setting in, and Alex still has a crush on Willie. He vows to himself not to do anything about it, because they still have to room together for the rest of the year, and what if Willie doesn’t reciprocate and he makes it all awkward?</p>
<p>Suddenly Christmas is right around the corner, and Alex tells his mom he’s not coming home because he’s busy with homework and exams. She doesn’t question it, even though there <em>aren’t</em> any exams after Christmas and logically speaking she should know that. But just as Alex doesn’t want to go home, his parents don’t actually want him to <em>be </em>home. So he makes plans to spend Christmas holed up in his dorm room, watching dumb Christmas movies and eating way too much snack food.</p>
<p>When Willie hears this, he smiles widely. “Caleb has like a <em>ton</em> of shows during this time of the year, so we never really celebrate Christmas. I was thinking of staying at the dorm as well.”</p>
<p>Alex blurts out, “Awesome! We should celebrate together!” Before he realizes that spending an intimate cozy Christmas alone with your crush is probably a <em>terrible</em> idea.</p>
<p>But it’s too late and Willie is excitedly nodding and making plans and before he knows it it’s Christmas eve, and Willie and Alex are huddled together in Alex’s bed, watching Love Actually. Willie’s shoulder is bumping against Alex’s and he can feel the heat of Willie’s body seeping into his. It feels intimate, and comfortable, and Alex wants to stay like this for the rest of his life.</p>
<p>Both of them have watched this movie before, so they keep running commentary throughout while snacking on popcorn. Alex had said it wasn’t very Christmassy, to which Willie had answered he could sprinkle some nutmeg on it if Alex really wanted to be more like Christmas, which had involved into a discussion about the flavoring that tasted the most like Christmas (Willie stayed on team Nutmeg, Alex was fully in camp peppermint).</p>
<p>“I still can’t believe you want your popcorn to taste like toothpaste,” Willie says, brining their fight up again.</p>
<p>Alex frowns at him. “First of all, not everything that tastes like peppermint tastes like toothpaste, and second of all, I just said it was the most Christmassy flavor, not that I wanted my popcorn to taste like it.</p>
<p>“Peppermint popcorn does have a nice ring to it,” Willie says, thoughtfully. “Try saying that three times fast.”</p>
<p>“See? Holds up a lot better than ‘nutmeg popcorn’. No offense but that sounds disgusting.”</p>
<p>Willie pulls a face at him. “<em>You</em> sound disgusting.”</p>
<p>Alex sticks out his tongue at him, and they fall back into silence as they continue to watch the movie. Alex is not really focusing on the movie, though, but more so on the boy besides him. It’s just weird to think where they came from, how much he <em>hated</em> Willie that first day. Granted, Willie did hit him in the face with an ice hockey helmet, but still. So much has changed over the year, and now he can hardly imagine his life without Willie in it.</p>
<p>“What’s up?” Willie asks, when he catches Alex staring.</p>
<p>Alex shakes his head. “Nothing, I was just… No, never mind.”</p>
<p>Willie nudges him with his elbow. “No, come on, tell me, what’s on your mind.”</p>
<p>“Just thinking about how much we hated each other in the beginning,” Alex says.</p>
<p>Willie snorts. “Oh, but I never hated you. Sure, you were a little bit snooty, but I never <em>hated</em> you.” He pauses, and looks at Alex. “Want to know a secret?” When Alex nods he continues, “I kind of thought you were really hot when we first met.”</p>
<p>Alex blinks, not sure what to do with that information aside from cherishing it his whole life. “That’s neat,” he eventually says, because he’s an idiot.</p>
<p>Willie smiles at him, almost fondly, and Alex is <em>blushing</em> he’s sure of it, but he can’t help himself. “Want to know another secret?”</p>
<p>“Depends,” Alex says, “Are you going to call me hot again?”</p>
<p>Willie shakes his head. “I go to Bobby’s house every year for Christmas,” he says.</p>
<p>Alex frowns a little, unsure what to do with this information. “Okay? Did he not invite you this year? Did you guys get in a fight?”</p>
<p>“No, you dummy,” Willie says, “he did invite me.”</p>
<p>“Then why didn’t you-“ Suddenly it dawns on Alex. “You wanted to spend Christmas with <em>me</em>,” he says, slightly disbelieving. Willie, who he’s been pining after for <em>months</em> now, cancelled his Christmas plans so he could spend time with Alex. It’s one of the most romantic things anyone has ever done for him.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Willie is no longer looking at him. “I guess this is as good a time as any to tell you I uh, kind of have a crush on you.”</p>
<p>“What?” Alex says, because he’s getting so much information right now and he <em>cannot</em> believe this is actually happening.</p>
<p>Willie is still not looking at him. “Since the beginning, really. You’re really cute, you know that?”</p>
<p>“No?” Alex squeaks, because what the <em>fuck</em> is happening? “Why are you telling me now?” He asks, because this seems <em>surreal</em>.</p>
<p>Willie shrugs. “Because it’s Christmas. Because I like you and I want to go out with you. Because we’ve been sitting under mistletoe for like two hours now and if we put off kissing any longer I think we will be cursed by the Christmas gods.”</p>
<p>“I don’t think that’s how mistletoe works,” Alex says, glancing up. And indeed, there it is. A little twig of mistletoe. One of their friends must have put that up there earlier today, right before they left for their own Christmas celebrations. Alex hadn’t noticed.</p>
<p>“Yeah, but do you want to take the risk?” Willie asks, and he’s looking at Alex, and he looks nervous, and suddenly Alex realizes what Willie is <em>actually</em> asking him.</p>
<p>“I don’t think. No, I don’t think I want to do that,” Alex squeaks, and suddenly willing is beaming at him.</p>
<p>“No, me neither,” Willie says, and then he’s closing the gap between them, pressing their lips together softly, and Alex feels like he’s floating.</p>
<p>When they pull away, Willie is grinning at him and Alex can feel himself grinning back. “Merry Chrismas, Alex,” he says, and pulls Alex in for another kiss.</p>
<p>Merry fucking Christmas, indeed.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>you can find me on tumblr <a href="http://violetevents.tumblr.com">here</a> :)</p></blockquote></div></div>
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